[AtLast]

Originally Posted by Jess

I cross posted this from the DADT thread, because sometimes ya can't hear enough good news!

Judge Orders Lesbian Reinstated To Air Force

by THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
September 24, 2010
A federal judge ruled Friday that a decorated flight nurse discharged from the Air Force for being gay should be given her job back as soon as possible in the latest legal setback to the military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy.


The decision by U.S. District Judge Ronald Leighton came in a closely watched case as a tense debate has been playing out over the policy. Senate Republicans blocked an effort to lift the ban this week, but two federal judges have ruled against the policy in recent weeks.


Maj. Margaret Witt was discharged under the "don't ask, don't tell" policy and sued to get her job back. A judge in 2006 rejected Witt's claims that the Air Force
violated her rights when it fired her. An appeals court panel overruled him two years later, leaving it to Leighton to determine whether her firing met that standard.


Witt, of Spokane, joined the Air Force in 1987 and was suspended in 2004 just short of retirement after her commanders learned she was in a relationship with a civilian woman. She was a flight nurse with an aeromedical evacuation squadron responsible for transporting and caring for injured soldiers.

Her attorneys, led by the American Civil Liberties Union of Washington, insisted that Witt was well respected and liked by her colleagues, that her sexuality never caused problems in the unit, and that her firing actually hurt military goals such as morale, unit cohesion and troop readiness. Several members of the squadron testified to that effect and said they would welcome Witt back to the unit.

Lawyers for the Air Force said such evidence was irrelevant.

Military personnel decisions can't be run by unit referendum, they said.

WOOT!!

I have been thinking about this- all of the military people (the ones that want to continue their military careers) discharged under DADT being reinstated in the midst of all of this political wrangling. Really good to see how her colleagues felt.

There are many that loved being in our military and truely wanted their service to be a career.

I am so discusted with the blockage of the DADT repeal as well as our service people not being given the pay raise in that bill. Is this some kind of sick way of setting up gays and lesbians to be targeted as the bad guys in all of this? I can just hear those that do not want to serve with gays and lesbians talking about how "if they just would shut up, we woulod be getting a raise." Then there is just the fact of messing with our military- how many have served in Iraq and Afghanistan multiple times, going through hell with families at home? This is just crazy!